1. Field of the Invention
The invention concerns a device for decapitating by a cutting action fish having their throat opened, the device comprising at least a support surface for the fish to be processed, with a cutting mechanism for performing the decapitating cut and a conveyor carrying at least one entraining element for moving the fish against the cutting mechanism.
2. Description of Prior Art
Various devices for beheading fish opened by their throat are known in which the gill cavity opened on the belly side by the throat cut is used as an aligning element to achieve an economical beheading cut. A beheading device can be taken e.g. from German Patent No. 1 579 416 in which the fish is suspended on a bar by its gill cavity opened by the throat cut, engaged at its head side and tail side by entraining elements emerging from below and pushed against the circular knife of the cutting mechanism. In this device it is necessary to bring the fish, which lies on its side, into the swimming position so that it, can be fed onto the conveying path, and at least to lift the head above the bar so that the latter can be inserted into the gill cavity. This handling is especially disadvantageous in heavier fish for ergonomic reasons. Furthermore, due to the conveying of the fish in a position transverse to their longitudinal extension in this known device, the head of the fish can only be separated by a plane cut which excludes the desired economy in cutting if it concerns the preparatory working step for producing boneless fillets. The economic applicability of the known device is therefore essentially limited to beheading fish which are to be processed further to dry cod (klipfish) snce there it is desired that the bones of the shoulder girdle remain on the rump of the fish as they serve as a prop in the spread position during drying.
3. Object of the Invention
It is therefore an essential object of the invention to provide for a possibility of beheading fish in an ergonomically more expedient manner. It is a further important object of the invention to put such decapitating into effect by enabling a further processing into boneless fillets at high yield.